Alchemy's Child
by Beboots
Summary: After Ed restores Al, the two fake their own deaths and flee Amestris. To support them, Ed takes on the coveted position of DADA professor at Hogwarts… Harry Potter Crossover!
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: Although it would be any fanfiction author's wet dream to have both J.K. Rowling and Arakawa-sensei collaborate on something, I am neither, and certainly not both. --; I own none of the characters you recognize, and in fact, I wasn't the first person to even think up the idea of a restarted, child!Alphonse. To give credit where credit is due, I was inspired by "Only Family" by Mikkeneko. To read, go to my favorites list (I have a lot of good ficcage over there, if you like crossovers, A/Us, etc.) or direct link here (delete spaces): **http://w ww.scimit arrsmile.c om/alch emy/01fic tion/01mikk enof.ph p?titleOn ly20Fa mily&a utho rMikk enek o&li st01mi kken**

* * *

**Alchemy's Child**

**Prologue : events of Upper Central and Lower Central**

Beneath the capital of Amestris lies a forgotten city: a shadow of Central above. The buildings are crumbling. Its' architecture contains nothing newer than what were common sights four hundred years prior. The cobblestone streets are as empty on this day as they have been for centuries.

However, dust has been disturbed; not all of the structures continue to lie empty. It is no longer quiet. Two tiny voices cry out into the silence.

"Rose, what happens now?" A third voice.

"He's hungry. Probably. Or he could just be cold." Another.

"Ha!" It was the uncertain chuckle of someone who hasn't had reason to laugh for a while. "First time in a long time, isn't it?" Now, a strained smile, false cheer.

The speakers pause. The first, the smaller, was a boy – a young man, really – awkwardly holding a naked and squalling infant in one arm. He was uncertain, and for good reason. He was a scientist, a soldier – not cut out for such business as holding young children.

The second was also holding a baby. This woman – a child, really – was wearing a dressed that matched the setting in this ancient city. "Is … is it really Al?" she asked quietly, barely heard over the combined cries of both infants. The woman leant over to peer at the red sigil on the chest of the blond child.

"If the Gate didn't screw us both over again." The boy swallowed, keeping his rising hysteria from his tone of voice. He really didn't know what to do. It had happened all too quickly; Rose, dancing – then Dante and the child – London and his father – dying and returning – Al and the Stone – the sudden appearance of the Gate, demanding payment – the Stone, gone, the homunculi, gone, Dante, gone, Al's armor, gone – all into the gaping maw of The Gate… Until there were just two souls, two brothers, standing before the Gate, staring, reaching. "My body!", "Al's body!" they cried in return for their toll, repeating until it blended together into one entreaty that _demanded_ an answer: "Body!". And with a perverse group of grins, from the darkness of the door's gap reached hundreds of groping hands accompanied by the ringing giggle of a hundred lost children. Both boys were consumed.

And what was left was one boy and one newborn with a sickeningly familiar red circle drawn upon his tiny chest. His red face, mouth impossibly large and wide, was a not-so-silent testimony to his displeasure at his current situation.

"Ed – we need to leave. There's nothing here."

The older brother lifted his head from the child in his arms for the first time. His golden eyes were tired. "Where can we go, Rose? I mean, if I – " he broke off, then continued with more conviction. "If _we_ actually succeeded, then … we… " They had worked so hard, for so many years to attain this goal, but had never contemplated as to what they would do _after_…The boy paced, eyes panicky, putting his one free hand to his head. "The military's got to be everywhere – human transmutation's _illegal_, the seal's right _there_, on his _chest_, anybody could figure it out when they realize Alphonse is- is missing, and – and – "

"Edward!" The woman said sharply. "We need to think up a plan! A good explanation that doesn't include the philosopher's stone!"

"I'm no good at plans!" He snapped, causing both infants to increase the volume of their screams in the way that only infants can, defying the small capacity of their lungs. "I've been making it up as I go!"

Her eyes softened. "Then we should start by getting something for the kids to eat. Small steps."

"What the hell do babies eat?!" Yes, a definite note of hysteria there. "I don't know anything about parenting!" He looked around wildly, as if the answer could be read on the floor, on the half-burnt transmutation circles on the walls and ceiling.

"You can learn." Rose said patiently. "I did. Walk forward. You still have two –"

"Yes, yes, I know!" Ed interrupted, scowling. "Two good legs. But Alphonse can't even walk, he's helpless and I don't—" '_know what I'm doing.'_

He looked down at his brother – he hoped. The infant had no Ouroboros tatoo, and certainly looked, felt and sounded like a human child. And he _did_ resemble some of their baby photos – but Al had been a quiet baby, according to his mother, and who knows if this really was the vessel for his little brother's soul?

Ed blinked when the cries petered off into loud hitching sobs, then quiet gasps. The baby's face was still red and quite wet, but it didn't seem so large with his mouth closed.

"He's tired." Rose said quietly. Her child, too, had become quiet, except for the occasional gurgle.

Ed nodded dumbly, still staring at "Al".

"You know, they can't excecute you if you're already dead."

Ed's head whipped up. "What?"

"I mean, if you have no reason to be in the miltary anymore, you could… leave. And leave something behind… to convice anybody who looks that you both died. Then they wouldn't come after you anymore, would they?"

"I…" He took his hand from his head. "That just might work."

* * *

It was amazing how quick men become with information gathering when in the prescence of hysterical women and bawling children. Rose wasn't entirely sure how the police officer understood her story in between her wailings and incoherent exclamations. "And then he screamed '_my brother's life or none_!' and he dissapeared in a ball of light!". Insert watery eyes and dramatic hair pulling. "Alchemy is the work of the devil! May Leto forgive his soul!" More tears, hands clasped in prayer. The baby strapped to her back increased it's crying to a fevered pitch. 

"Calm down ma'am, I just need a little bit more infor—"

He was interrupted by another wail, rising in pitch in such a way as to make a soprano opera singer jealous.

"I'll all be okay, ma'am." The officer droned. "Now, could you just tell me –"

"Wh-wh-wwwhyyyyy?" Sob sob. Uncomfortable shifting on the part of the male officer. The baby wailed in a more sincere echo of his mother's tears. "What's the point? He's gone!"

Finally, after many false starts and fits of weeping, the officer concluded his questions, determining by eyewitness account that one Edward Elric had committed suicide upon the death of his younger brother, Alphonse Elric. There would be investigations, of course, but how can one identify the corpse of someone who has been consumed by alchemy? Better to leave it for the State Alchemists. The policeman shuffled awkwardly away from the still weeping woman, getting into his vehicle and shutting the door with finality. He slowly drove away, leaving the woman and her child sitting on a piece of rubble not far away from the old church that was the entrance to the hidden city. The woman rubbed her child's back in a comforting manner as his wails slowed to loud hiccups and finally a simple raspy breathing.

Rose's own face relaxed. The tears dried.

* * *

It really was pathetically easy to sneak out of Central city, even with the military checkpoints. He really would have to speak with his superior officer about it… if, well, he was to go back. Which he wasn't, Ed assured himself, adjusting the sling on his back that contained the sleeping baby. Of course, it did help that he could simply melt through any wall, out of sight_. 'Damn, alchemy is useful'_, he thought, not for the first time. 

He waited for Rose in the woods in the outskirts of Central for several hours. In the time since they'd separated, Edward had discovered the first of many things about babies he hadn't previously been aware of.

First and foremost: babies were terrifying. They began crying at the most inopportune moments (such as when he was trying to slip over a guarded fence). Ed had nearly had a heart attack the first time that had happened. The first time Al had nearly slid out of the sling and onto the ground, too, had scared the crap out of him – babies were fragile, and this one could barely hold up his head, let alone know how to fall properly (both brothers had had hitting the ground down to an art after Izumi-sensei's training). Since then, except for the swift movements he made when transmuting, Ed had kept one hand perpetually resting on the cloth-wrapped bundle, keeping it balanced and reassuring himself that Al was, indeed, still there.

Once Rose arrived, Ed had learnt yet another baby-related tidbit of knowledge; what exactly breasts were used for. Sure, he had known, intellectually, what they were for. He even had known how they went about their function, anatomically, having run across such information while researching the female body in the hopes of fabricating one for their mother. But never before had he seen them put to use.

Al had been crying again, and Ed had had no idea what to do. Most alarmingly, the baby had been screaming so much it was growing more hoarse…quieter. When Rose had come along, she'd promptly plucked Al from his arms, replaced him with her own sleeping Cain, pulled down the collar of her dress a ways, and proceeded to… nurse. Ed had watched in horrified fascination as Al's red cheeks faded to a more healthy light pink, and began making happy little noises, a little bit of white milk escaping the corner of his mouth, dribbling down onto Rose's chest…. And Ed's own face had abruptly turned red, and he swiftly averted his gaze to the baby in his own arms. Rose was… secreting … fluids … to feed his brother. Breast milk, his mind supplied. Milk, as in opaque fatty liquid secreted by mammals to feed their young. Eeew….

When Rose finally lifted his brother from her… bosom… Al was no longer upset. In fact, Al had the good grace to look almost… embarrassed. Now _that_ was an odd look for an infant to have…

Rose interrupted his musings with a curt, "Ed, find something we can use as a diaper." She looked him in the eye. "Quickly." The baby in her arms flushed red. Definitely embarrassed. Definitely… possibly? Alphonse. Ed shoved the thought to the side as he sought some material he could transmute into a baby's… waste receptacle.

But the lingering doubt remained. Was the baby's body the host his brother's soul?

The fear wasn't dispersed until several months later upon hearing the baby's first word: "Nii-san."

* * *

Author's Note: Why hello there!:D 

I love reading fanfiction and writing long reviews – especially for well-written A/Us and crossovers (so if anybody has any recommendations… ;) ). If you want evidence (or just a good recommendation), check out my massive favorites list on my profile! In any case, I figure it's probably about time that I write my own (decent, I hope) crossover to add to the mix for others to enjoy!

And please, if something doesn't make sense or doesn't seem to be working (or even if you spot a typo, or an awkwardly phrased sentence), please review and tell me so! I like constructive criticism (…and compliments, but don't we all? ;) ), because I really do want to improve my writing style. There's always room for improvement!

I would also like to say that I chose to post this today for a reason: to celebrate Canada Day! I'm a proud Canadian citizen, you see. :) Also, I'd like to mention that I do have more of this fic written, but there won't be very quick updates unless I'm pushed. I'm a notoriously slow writer, and while I have BITS of chapters written, I actually have only one other completed chapter - and that's chapter three. So... as you can imagine, it may be a few weeks before I get the next chapter up. Sorry!

Oh, and I would like everyone to know that I do not approve of throwing in random Japanese words into fanfiction, except in the cases of honorifics (such as "-san") and the names of certain attacks (in other fandoms, I mean). However, I do believe that Alphonse should call his brother "nii-san", not "brother", because, well… It makes them sound like monks in English. - -; (You know, "You're late for matins, brother Elric.", and "Let us sit down and pray, brother.") I promise that such things will be kept to a minimum.


	2. Chapter One: the Old and the Young

**Chapter One: in which the old and the young meet, and the youngest is particularly eloquent**

* * *

**Four years later**

**Somewhere in Scotland**

**Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry**

It was… an application letter. Extremely unusual. Dumbledore peered over his half-moon spectacles at the open envelope in his hands. Yes, it was still the same: "_To Headmaster Dumbledore_, _regarding the open position of Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor._" The rest of the letter was relatively short, written in the awkward reserved fashion that one sees only on job applications and obituaries. However, the fact remained: _someone had actually applied._ Perhaps he wouldn't have to accept the ministry's replacement! The ever-present twinkle in the headmaster's eyes grew in wattage, if such a thing could be considered possible.

He didn't recognize the name: Edward Heiderich. Perhaps he was muggleborn, or German. Perhaps both. Perhaps it was even a false name, but Dumbledore himself had used them on occasion, so he couldn't really fault him. If it _was_ an alias, it would become apparent after a while. Dumbledore was good at finding out about those sorts of things (being a Legitimens helped, although that took all the challenge out of it).

Yes, it was certainly worth looking into: an actual application! He'd had to go out recruiting the last few years to find someone competent, but crazy enough to take up the supposedly cursed position. Anyone, he mused, would be better than whatever spy the ministry would send.

The address, too, was unusual: _Butterwort Field, South London, England._ What an odd name for a manor. Perhaps it was new; he didn't remember anything in that particular area, but then again, it had been many years, and he was getting old. Dumbledore supposed he should pay a visit, to see what sort of person this Mr. Heiderich was. Short of being an overt Death Eater, or barring other extreme circumstances, Dumbledore believed he'd found this year's Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. The Headmaster smiled, folded up the letter, and tucked it into his robes. He reached into his desk, withdrew a well-worn tin and, upon opening it, placed one of its contents in his mouth. '_Mmmm…. Lemon drop..._' Dumbledore thought with no small amount of glee.

* * *

The Headmaster had been correct; there was no manor house in this particular field. In fact, it was a very bare patch of ground, nothing but waving grass and a few small, scraggly trees. Ah, but there was a small plume of smoke towards one of those trees. He made his way towards this landmark, his purple robes making a sharp contrast to the pale green-brown of the grass. The Headmaster's height allowed him to see over the tall not-so-green greenery, and what he saw upon his approach was an old car, brown, roofless and tinged red in some places with rust, and a small fading campfire. Around it were various cooking implements, pots, pans, plates and cups, placed in two piles. One of these piles was on the verge of tipping over, if the leaning was any indication. 

There was no one there.

Until he drew closer to the car, that is, and espied someone, in a coat so brown as to match the faded and scuffed leather seats, curled up in the back. The long blond hair was the only part of the person he could see that wasn't brown.

Dumbledore, being a generally polite person (except to insincere ministry officials and Death Eaters), knocked on the side of the car door. "Excuse me, Miss, could you tell me –" With a start, the person sat up, turned towards the sound, flailed for a moment for balance, wavering, and fell to the floor of the car. "Oh, I do apologize, my dear girl." The headmaster opened the car door to help the person he had just disturbed up, only to discover his mistake.

The face belonging to the blond-haired, brown-coated person was most definitely male. Rounded with the last traces of baby fat, perhaps, scowling, indeed, and one cheek covered with a tracery of red marks no doubt from resting his weight against the leather of the car seat for hours on end, but most undeniably male. The same, too, could be said of the voice.

"The Hell was that about, old man?" Momentarily taken aback, Dumbledore paused, hand outstretched, arrested in its movement to help the boy up.

"Nii-san," came a sleepy voice from a bundle in the front seat. "You should be polite to your elders."

The boy gave the origin of the voice a soft look before he breathed a haggard sigh that turned into a yawn. He then accepted Dumbledore's proffered hand.

"Sorry about that, my dear boy." The brown coated fellow shot him a look, '_who are you calling so short people mistake him for a five year old?!',_ but said nothing to the headmaster.

"Al, go back to sleep!" He called over his shoulder as he walked to the fire and poked it back to life with a charred twig – not a wand, Dumbledore noted with interest. Most wizards would instinctively reach for their wands in such situations.

The flames once more becoming visible, the boy erected a rough tripod, made of slightly larger twigs and branches (likely taken from the tree underneath which he had taken residence) and placed a scratched tin teapot upon the structure, over the flames. Only then did he withdraw his wand – short, like the rest of him, Dumbledore observed – muttering quickly under his breath to fill it with water before tossing in some brown powder from a separate tin. This ritual completed, he sat cross-legged in front of the fire, and motioned the elder wizard to sit down across from him.

"You're Headmaster Dumbledore, right?" The boy said, voice still rough from sleep. "I've seen you in the papers."

"Indeed. I hope you read some of the more flattering articles." Eye twinkle.

The boy made a non-committal sound, ignoring the Headmaster's glinting gaze.

"I happen to be looking for a Mr. Heiderich. Does he live in the area?"

The boy looked up at him. "Heiderich? That's me." Heiderich had golden eyes: most unusual, except in werewolves. But the full moon had been just days ago, and Heiderich didn't seem too tired or worn about the edges as most werewolves would be.

"You're Heiderich?" The boy couldn't be more than sixteen years old, seventeen at most. What did he think he was doing, applying for a cursed teaching position, of all things, when he should rightly still be in school?

"Isn't that what I just said?" Heiderich stabbed at the fire with the twig he had been using earlier, sending sparks flying into the air.

"I am Professor Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry." Even if Heiderich already knew his name, Dumbledore was, as previously stated, nothing if not polite, especially to the rare creature that was a Defense Against the Dark Arts applicant.

The younger man stopped torturing the fire. "I only sent in that application yesterday. That was… quick." Just then, the teapot began emitting a high-pitched whistling sound.

'_No, not particularly_,' thought Albus, '_Unless one is unused to the speed at which owls deliver mail_.' The twinkling blue eyes narrowed a fraction.

Heiderich swiftly removed the pot from its perch above the fire, sloshing a little water on his right arm in his haste. "Coffee?" He asked, distracted, pouring out one cup for himself, presumably. Dumbledore accepted a mug of the hot liquid.

"You were fairly vague in your letter." It was job interview time. "What makes you think that you are qualified to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts?" _Sip. 'Ah, bitter.'_

Heiderich looked the headmaster in the eyes over his mug of coffee for a moment. "I've been trained in martial arts since I was nine. I know a decent amount of magic as well." He sipped his coffee, not making a face at the bitterness of the drink as Dumbledore had. "I believe that I could teach your students how to defend themselves if the war you said is going on in the papers were to actually occur."

"So you believe that the Dark Lord has returned."

"I don't know anything about any dark lords." He took another sip of coffee. "All I know is that you think that he – this guy nobody says the name of – is a threat to your school and your students. I believe that you believe this guy's returned or whatever. It's what the employer thinks that counts." The slurping of more coffee interrupted his speech for a moment. "You want your students to know how to defend themselves, right? Well, I can help with that." Heiderich drained the last of his drink and set the cup aside. Dumbledore was less than half finished. There was another lull in the conversation, until the contemplative headmaster finally smiled.

"Aha! You're Amestrian!" Dumbledore smiled, triumphant. The object of his gaze leant backwards, avoiding the twinkling. That was…obviously not the response Heiderich had expected. The headmaster had been trying ever since the conversation began to place the slight accent the boy had; there was something Japanese in the way he pronounced 'r's, but his 'v's and 'w's were almost what you would expect from German. But still, the accent had been strangely familiar… And it had clicked. Amestris, the largest unplottable area in the world…. no-one had gone in or out of the land (legally, anyway) since it had split from the rest of the magical world over four centuries previously.

Dumbledore knew the politics of it; one radical magical group disagreed with the mainstream opinion – they thought magic could be quantified, and sacrifices were to be made for any spell used. Of course, most disagreed with such a thing; magic was magic, after all, their was no equivalent exchange – that was the definition of "magic", was it not? So the alchemically inclined wizards made their own territory unplottable and refused to let anyone from the rest of the wizarding community in, not even for trade.

Of course, there had been exceptions – the headmaster specifically remembered an old research partner of Nicholas Flamel's who had had the same odd accent. He, as a young man, had inquired to Flamel about it, and had been told in a hushed whisper: "Amestrian, but no-one's to know." He couldn't even recall the man's name – it must have been nigh ninety years ago.

In response to Dumbledore's "accusation" of illegal immigration status, Heiderich had stood so swiftly that he knocked over the teapot and sent it into the fire, throwing up a huge cloud of steam as the liquid extinguished the flames. "I – " The rest of his response was garbled, starting one thought and never finishing. "I – we – that is to say…"

The car door opened. "We're refugees, sir." The speaker, Al, if Dumbledore remembered Heiderich calling him earlier, was a young boy of perhaps four. He was clutching a ragged blanket around his shoulders, and with his ruffled hair and wide eyes, he certainly had the look of a young boy away from home.

Heiderich collected himself upon hearing the boy's words. "That's right." He sat down abruptly as the younger boy approached the (ex)fire, and continued. "There … was the threat of another war." '_Not exactly a lie_,' Edward thought. '_There's been a lot of tension over by the Drachman borders and Liore isn't exactly a peaceful paradise anymore.' _His hair fell over his eyes. '_And whose fault is that? No. Focus.' _"The military rules our government, and recruits anybody of age and able-bodied." '_Also true, although it wouldn't normally affect me, as an officer.'_ "Al has no-one to take care of him but me. If I was enlisted, he'd be alone." The young boy, sitting next to Heiderich, leant closer, as if on cue.

Dumbledore sat, still and silent, across the fire from the two Amestrians. There had been a truthful ring to the younger man's words; without eye contact, he wouldn't know for sure. But the more he thought about it, the more obvious it seemed that the two were, indeed, homeless – the car looked very lived-in. '_Alone at such a young age, too….' _The wizard thought, something twisting inside him. '_A boy that young shouldn't have a son. Although, if he was responsible enough to take care of his offspring… ' _

"How old are you?" Dumbledore asked finally. Heiderich's eyebrow twitched, '_who are you calling so short he's mistaken for an embryo?!'_, but sighed instead of responding verbally.

"I look… too young, don't I?" Asked the blond after a moment. He sighed again. "I'm twenty. Alphonse is four." He stared, determined, into Dumbledore's eyes, and the headmaster read both truth and lies there. It was obvious that Alphonse was probably the age that Heiderich said, but Heiderich himself can't have been more than seventeen at most, even if he was unusually short. But if he was skilled enough to control a class and teach them what they needed to know, surely age shouldn't matter? He really, really needed someone who wasn't under the Ministry's thumb to teach this class…

After a full minute of silent staring, Alphonse yawned at Heiderich's side. Concentration broken, the soon-to-be Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor looked to the young boy curled at his right side.

"Oh, shit." Heiderich seemed to have just noticed he'd split coffee on his pristine white glove and not-so-pristine right sleeve. He lifted it from his son's shoulders and shook the damp material as if he could remove the offending stain with sheer force of his will.

"Nii-san, don't swear."

The corners of Dumbledore's eyes crinkled. If one ignored the obvious age difference and went simply with the way that the two acted, one would assume that Alphonse was the father.

"What were your magical studies like in Amestris?" The Headmaster asked. He had to know how his new professor was qualified.

Heiderich looked up from fussing with his sleeve. "Er, I had none." He looked a little awkward. "But I know magic!" The blond hurriedly continued, needing to convince his possible employer of his competency. "I've been reading, teaching myself since I got to England." The child at his side nodded in agreement.

Dumbledore was just a little disappointed; at his age, he didn't often run into new forms of magic. He would have liked to see how it had developed differently in a country isolated for so long. He had seen Heiderich use his wand to produce water, so he obviously wasn't a muggle or a squib … so why hadn't he had a magical education? Perhaps they didn't have a universal education system in Amestris, he mused. Or maybe they hadn't independently developed the means to detect muggleborns…

In any case… "Will you permit me to test you, then?"

"I—of course."

Dumbledore's smile reached his eyes. "Would you consent to a little friendly duel?" Heiderich looked surprised for a moment, but nodded. "Now I don't expect you to beat me," the Headmaster said, standing up, his old joints creaking. "I would like to see, however, where your talents lie."

* * *

Heiderich grinned wolfishly at the older man, twenty feet across from him. The wind rustled the long grass that rested between the two combatants. Alphonse watched calmly from the sidelines, still seated by the fire. His calm wasn't to be mistaken for disinterest, however, as he watched them both with an intense eye. 

"Shall we begin?" Asked Dumbledore mildly as he drew his wand. "There will be no restrictions besides those of attacks that would be considered unsportsmanlike; therefore, no killing, maiming, etc." His eyes twinkled once again. "Although I think that goes without saying considering this is a job interview. Agreed?" The elderly man asked of the one across from him.

"Agreed." They both bobbed short bows. Heiderich then shifted his weight, widening his stance, extending one hand forward. He didn't draw his wand as the headmaster had. Dumbledore raised his wand-hand above his head and adopted a more traditional dueling posture.

"Begin!" At Dumbledore's shouted word, Edward immediately lunged to his right. A good thing he did, as the older man had lost no time in firing off several spells. The flashes of light seared neatly through the grass where Ed had stood moments before.

Edward hit the ground in a quickly maneuvered somersault, rolling upright just in time to dodge another flash of light from Dumbledore's wand.

It was only then (after diving forward to avoid another rattled-off spell) that the younger man drew his own wand.

Dumbledore was surprised (something that didn't happen often, at his age). Heiderich had yet to send any spells off in his opponents' direction. However, he hadn't used any defensive spells, either – but his evasive maneuvers were quite impressive. Although spells took the form of streams of light, they in fact traveled much slower than light itself; definitely slower than sound, for example, as one had time to hear the spell being cast before one was hit by it. But still, spells traveled very quickly through the air, faster than a ball thrown with all of one's strength, and some were quite wide. Those ones should be particularly difficult to avoid, but it would appear that Mr. Heiderich was very adept at avoiding things that had been thrown at him. '_Interesting'_, Dumbledore thought - not for the first time – as he prepared himself for Heiderich's spells; such evasive tricks would be incredibly useful for several of his students he had in mind, not the least of which was Mr. Potter.

Spell casting wasn't Edward's favorite form of attack, but considering the whole point of this exercise was to test his ability to do so, he didn't have a whole lot of leeway. He wracked his mind of his (admittedly, limited) library of spells suitable for dueling, and came up with one. Simple enough, but the trick was pulling it off. If there was one thing that Edward had learnt during his time with the military, image counted for everything in demonstrations of force. It wasn't enough to just do it; one had to present it in a way that was to your best advantage. The bastard Colonel had been a master of this. Why else be an expert in a, relatively speaking, useless form of alchemy? Fiery explosions were flashy, impressive and scared the heck of one's opponents, that's why.

In any case, Dumbledore didn't look like the type to confuse "flash" with "substance". But Edward still needed something relatively impressive, and original. The latter would be difficult to pull off, considering his opponents apparent age. He'd have to try to pull off something _new _for a man over a century old.

Best to go for the element of surprise.

In most wizarding duels, the duelists stood at least ten feet from each other, often more. This was "safer" for both parties, as it gave time to counteract one's opponent's spells. Most wizards with significant experience in duels (such as the esteemed headmaster before him, veteran of at least two magical wars and probably countless other, more minor conflicts) would expect the same such distance. As such, he was unlikely to be skilled in close-quarter combat. Unlikely, that is. Dumbledore was still very old, and by reputation very wily.

But the Headmaster was still a wizard by profession, and as such fairly useless without a wand. If he could highlight how dependant wizards were on their wands (silly, fragile things that they were, especially compared to the beauty of a well-drawn transmutation circle), show that there were alternatives that _he_ could teach…

Edward had nearly five years of intense military experience out in the field under his belt, mostly just doing the Colonel's dirty work. In addition, under Izumi, he'd been required to learn both long-range attacks, such as alchemical spikes and blasts, and close-quarter combat, both empty-palmed and with alchemized hand-weapons. One excelled in all forms of combat or perished under Izumi's tutelage.

In that case, Edward had a clear advantage in close quarters. Now his challenge was to get close enough to attack.

This was achieved by a combination of ducking and weaving his way forward, and casting his first spells – defensive shields. They were strategically small, just enough to block the incoming attacks; there was no point in wasting valuable energy protecting a huge wall of defensive magic, considering his… size.

Steadily, he moved forward. At one point, Dumbledore threw a nasty-sounding jelly-legs curse at his legs, and so Edward had to hastily draw up the earth before him in a rudimentary transfigured wall. There was no way he was about to be tricked into using his alchemy this early in the game – even if that meant he was forced to use the horrendous parody of transmutation, transfiguration.

Dumbledore was surprised at the sudden appearance of a low wall; it was as if the young man had just…. pulled it out of the ground with his wand. He noted "skilled at transfiguration in battle" alongside "skilled at spell evasion" in his mind. However, his brief moment of hesitation at the appearance of the wall gave Heiderich ample time to swing himself over the wall and suddenly be entirely too close for comfort.

Heiderich swished and flicked, muttering something Dumbledore couldn't quite catch as he himself was speaking the incantation for a generic counter-spell. '_That was one of the problems in duels – anticipation, casting shields and just hoping they held_._ That transfigured dirt wall had been a stroke of genius,_' Dumbledore thought with interest. _'Most spells were indeed stopped when they struck something solid, if not ricocheting to hit one's opponent. Useful.' _

As soon as he finished his incantation, the headmaster knew something was wrong. It was the feeling one got when walking up a staircase in the dark, thinking there was one more step than there actually was – a sickening feeling that something was missing. Something was intrinsically wrong. It took Dumbledore a mere moment to figure it out.

His spell hadn't gone off. His wand had never failed him before (well, except that _one_ time in 1923 when he had had too much fire-whiskey and – but that wasn't important right now!). And there was Heiderich, standing in front of him, wand at his throat, just a slight hint of a smirk at his lips… And Dumbledore looked at his wand.

There were flowers growing out of his wand-tip. _Flowers_. Rather nice ones, too, he noted: orchid-like. His wand had spontaneously sprouted… flowers.

No, not spontaneously. Heiderich had done it – that spell.

"Well, do I win, Headmaster?" Heiderich's unusual eyes twinkled. Ah, now he understood why Severus hated it when he himself did that. It was indeed 'creepily annoying'.

Albus Dumbledore bowed his head. "I concede defeat." Heiderich removed his wand from the elder wizard's throat. "I don't suppose I could trouble you to fix my wand?"

"Oh? Yes, yes," the blond nodded, looking a little flustered. Another muttered incantation, a short series of swishes and flicks, and Heiderich plucked the plants from the wand tip, leaving the wood undamaged, and, as far as Dumbledore could see, unchanged. But just to be sure (one didn't survive two separate wars against dark wizards on assumptions), Dumbledore tested it by turned the tip of his long beard a bright Weasley red. It all seemed in good working order.

"Well then, Mr. Heiderich," Dumbledore smiled, putting his wand away after restoring his beard to its' normal white luster, "I believe that there is a place for you – and Alphonse – at Hogwarts. Will you accept?" He held out his wrinkled but wizened left hand.

Heiderich, too smiled, and took it. "Why not?"

"Welcome to Hogwarts, Mr. Heiderich."

* * *

Author's Note: Why hello again! XD I actually didn't think I'd get this out as "quickly" as I did, however... here it is! I only really have one more chapter written, so I'm not entirely sure how swift the updates will be - but I really want to post the next chapter! But then I have no more, so I'm torn! ;; 

In any case, for timeline purposes, this fic takes place during Harry's fifth year (if it's not apparent by what's been written so far) because we all like to torture Umbridge, even if it means we have to put up with CAPSLOCK!Harry.

If Alphonse seemed unusually mature in chapter one, I wanted to say that I've done that deliberately. Alphonse if four, but he's nearly twenty as well, you understand.

Once again, I'd like to thank you all for reading, and I'd really appreciate it if you could drop by a review! I love constructive criticism, but the occasional "lol this was great" or something really helps my self-esteem. :)


	3. Chapter Two: New People and Creatures

**Chapter two: in which the train is very crowded, as per usual**

"So who do you figure Dumbledore got as the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher? Think they'll last the year?" Neville asked Ginny as they walked down the crowded corridor inside the Hogwarts Express.

"I don't know. I just hope they can teach." she replied, elbowing a second year that tried to squeeze past them with an overstuffed trunk. Neville clutched Trevor closer to himself for protection. "I mean, someone like Professor Lupin would be nice, or even the real Mad-Eye. As long as they're not evil." Neville nodded in agreement, not voicing his sincere hope that Snape hadn't finally achieved his rumored dream of acquiring the post this year. "Here's a free compartment!" Knowing they were filling quickly, the two students made a hard right into the spotted compartment. Empty, good.

The two sat across from each other, but barely a moment had passed by before there was a loud _thud _from the corridor and the door opened again, and an odd looking girl entered the compartment. The bottle corks arranged on a string around her neck jangled against her chest in what must have been an uncomfortable manner. As she turned to sit down beside Ginny, Neville noticed she had a wand placed behind her ear, not at all hidden by her waist-length blond hair.

"Oh – hello," The girl said slowly, as if she had just noticed that the train compartment was occupied.

"You're… Luna, right?" Queried Ginny uncertainly. "From Ravenclaw."

"Yes." She said, pulling out a magazine and promptly burying her face in it. The title was upside-down.

"Did you have a good summer, Luna?" Ginny continued.

Luna briefly peeked up from behind her magazine, revealing her perpetually surprised facial expression. "Oh, yes." The eyes disappeared again. Neville and Ginny exchanged looks, shrugged and started up a conversation regarding Neville's new prized Mimbulus mimbletonia.

They weren't long into their discussion of the various properties of the stinksap that the boils produced (Neville was much more enthused about this topic than Ginny, and had even removed the plant from his suitcase to emphasize some of the finer points on the subject) when the compartment door slid open again. Neville's toad squirmed in his hands at the sight of the open door.

"Hi, Ginny, hi Neville. Do you mind if I sit down?" It was Harry Potter.

"Of course, Harry." Ginny nodded, and Harry slid into the seat next to Neville.

"Thanks, it's a zoo out there. I'd be surprised if there are any empty compartments left." Harry slouched in his seat. "Hermione and Ron are in the prefect's car." He confided, and he was about to inquire as to who was behind that upside-down magazine when the train compartment slid open once again.

Neville grabbed Trevor as the toad made another aborted attempt at freedom.

"Crap, our compartment's been taken." The grumpy voice belonged to a scowling face framed by almost saffron-yellow hair. The head and body belonging to that face was bent over, supporting a small child on it's back. As soon as they entered the compartment, the younger boy slid down off of his elder's back. Saying a quick, "Nii-san, don't swear! It's impolite!" to the blond, he turned to the rest of the compartment and whispered, "Sorry, he's just crotchety because he hasn't had his coffee yet."

"Coffee shortages make me grumpy, not deaf, Al." The blond stretched his white-gloved hands towards the ceiling and yawned. His jaw cracked and he turned to the four sitting students. "So why have you invaded our compartment?"

Harry straightened from his slouch. "We didn't invade it! You just got here!"

The newcomer raised an eyebrow and pointed to the luggage rack on the ceiling. It was stuffed with shopping bags, many of them Harry recognized as coming from Flourish and Blotts. Shoved to the side was a small shabby brown suitcase. "We were here earlier. Al had to go to the bathroom."

The young boy, Al, apparently, flushed, and he piped up indignantly, "Nii-san, you don't have to tell them about my – my – bodily functions!" Now _that_ wasn't a phrase one often heard from children as young as that, Harry thought with surprise.

The elder smirked fondly and roughly ruffled Al's hair with his left hand. "I changed your diapers, I'm immune to poop jokes."

"Excuse me, but who are you?" Ginny interrupted. "I mean, this is the Hogwarts Express, after all. Only students are allowed on this trip." The blond raised hand from the child's head and looked at her sternly, as if daring her to ask '_who's so short he could pass for a negative fifth year student?!'_. "You're too old to be a first year, and I know for a fact that he's too young." His glare softened just a little bit.

"I'm Professor Heiderich. I was hired over the summer to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts this year."

Harry contemplated this statement for a moment. The man (boy? he asked himself hesitantly, wondering about his age) standing in their compartment (so far) hadn't presented as a nervous wreck of a possessed servant of the dark lord, or a pompous and bombastic liar, nor was he a paranoid disguised Death Eater with more scars than Frankenstein's monster, probably wasn't a disgruntled potions master, and wasn't overtly evil.

Their new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher had said "poop" and "joke" in the same sentence.

Somehow, Harry simply couldn't see a disguised Lucius Malfoy or whoever acting in such a manner.

The Professor broke the silence – in fact, it wasn't truly silent in the first place, as the walls of the train compartment were certainly not soundproof. One could hear any sound from the crowded corridor, overlaid by the steady thumping coming from beneath their feet as the train continued on its' journey.

"So who are we sharing this compartment with?" It took a moment for them to realize that they were being asked their names.

"Luna Lovegood." Surprisingly, it was a Ravenclaw, not a Gryffindor, who took the initiative.

"Ginny Weasley."

"I'm nobody!" Neville squeaked, worried he'd already gotten on the bad side of their new professor; he was going to have a hard enough time in classes without the teacher being out to get him! Potions… Neville gave an involuntary shiver.

"No you're not!" Ginny hissed. "He's Neville Longbottom, Professor." She said a more normal tone of voice.

"Harry Potter." Harry said quietly. Here was the test; how would the new teacher react to being introduced to the famous Boy-Who-Lived? The lunatic Boy-Who-Lived? The Daily Prophet's new favorite verbal punching bag?

"Can you budge over a bit? Al's been on his feet almost since five am."

"Er – sure." Harry said, blinking in surprise, only to find a cheerful four-year-old sitting beside him.

"I'm Alphonse Heiderich." The boy said with a smile, looking about the compartment. "It's very nice to meet you all. I'm sure Nii-san feels the same, right Nii-san?" He looked to his relative for confirmation. Harry wondered if they were father and son or what. From their looks, it was obvious that they were related, but wasn't the Professor awfully young to have such an old child? Well, he wasn't going to risk any more ire from his Professor by asking awkward personal questions. First impressions could last most of the year, if not longer, after all.

Professor Heiderich himself sat down beside the Ravenclaw (who was once again buried in her magazine) with a quiet huff. Apparently, he, too, had been on his feet since four in the morning, and he'd had to carry a young child as well through a crowded corridor to protect said child from being trampled by stampeding students. The Professor folded his arms across his chest, tucked his head down, closed his eyes and, for all intents and purposes, fell asleep.

"Nii-san always sleeps on train rides." Alphonse told them. His feet didn't touch the floor, but rather dangled level with about halfway down Harry's shins. There was another lull in the conversation. It was the awkward pause of acquaintances that have just discovered that they really don't know too much of anything about each other, but are hesitant to ask because really, it's none of their business.

Once again, Luna surprised them all by taking the initiative. "Are you from Germany, Alphonse?"

After the briefest of pauses, Al answered. "Yes, of course! How can you tell?"

"You speak strangely." Well, she was one to talk about bizarreness, wasn't she? Sure, Harry had noticed a slight accent in the boy's speech patterns, but it wasn't as if he was incomprehensible. The opposite, in fact: his English was exceedingly good for such a young child. "Have you ever seen any Snorkacks in Germany?"

"Snorkacks?" Al's brow furrowed. "Er, maybe they're something different in German?" He offered.

"Oh, well, they're usually spotted in Sweden, you know. I thought I'd ask." The girl shrugged dreamily.

"But what are they?" The boy asked curiously, his interest peaked.

"They're not real, is what they are." Ginny said, jumping in. "Honestly, Luna, you shouldn't try to trick children," She scolded.

"There have been numerous authenticated sightings –" Luna began as huffily as a person of her character was capable of.

"By who? Drunk muggles?"

"Reliable witnesses! You know there's been a publishing ban on their names; otherwise they'd get obliviated. It's a conspiracy, you know. It's as well known a fact as the Ministry's secret Heliopath herd," The girl concluded.

Alphonse seemed to digest this. He nodded to himself, as if he were deciding to determine later whether or not she was a liar who enjoyed spinning wild, unbelievable tales to trick children, or simply a well-informed individual with good sources.

After a moment, the child turned to Neville (currently, the tallest person in the compartment), and asked, "Would you mind fetching my book from my bag? I'm not quite sure I can reach it."

"Oh, er, sure." Neville got up and tugged on the suitcase that had been pointed out to him.

"It's the one on the top of the pile, the brown one." Alphonse steered the older boy after the suitcase was opened. It was stuffed to the brim with books; the only objects in it not of a literary nature were a small squished bundle of clothes in one corner, and a clear plastic bag containing two toothbrushes. "Thank you," said the child politely as Neville replaced the suitcase to its former position. This in itself sounded easier to do than it was, as the train's continual movement had jostled the row of shopping bags and had tipped them into the space formerly occupied by the piece of luggage.

Alphonse balanced the hardcover book awkwardly on his small lap. It was a copy of "_Hogwarts: a History_", Harry noted with surprise. The cover was larger than the four-year-olds' torso. The boy opened the book about halfway through, removed a bookmark, and commenced reading. As far as Harry could tell, the younger boy was indeed reading, and not just looking at the pictures. Their new professor must have taught his son to read at a very young age for him to be wading through such difficult books (even Hermione didn't consider "_Hogwarts: a History_" light reading).

Harry, Neville and Ginny distracted themselves for a little while by playing a game of exploding snap (at least until the frequent small explosions of the cards woke up the sleeping Professor). But before Heiderich could do anything more than growl sleepily at them, there was a knock on the compartment door and a cheerful call, "Anything off the trolley, dears?"

Glad of a distraction, Harry withdrew his coin pouch and loaded himself up on chocolate frogs, pumpkin pasties, and a bag of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans (for the excitement, not the taste). He even bought a few extras for Ginny, because he knew that Mrs. Weasley hadn't yet broken the habit of making corned beef sandwiches for her children for the train. He noticed that even the Professor made a few purchases; his son had put aside his book and was cautiously examining a squirming chocolate frog in his hands, as if wondering if it was all right to eat it.

It wasn't long after the trolley had left that the compartment had further visitors – Malfoy and his bulky shadows, Crabbe and Goyle.

"Well, well, well, what do we have here?" Malfoy said in the manner that only people of the insanely rich, confident, and hair-greased back persuasion could say and actually be taken seriously. "We have a Potty, a Weasel, a loon, a squib and two midgets. Been expanding your circle of… friends, Potter?" He smirked. "I suppose you would have to, after the last one got killed off."

"Malfoy," Harry ground out from between his clenched teeth. "Get. Out." He had pushed himself to his feet and was standing face-to-face with the interloper.

"Where are your manners today, Potter? Or did your mother not teach you any before she died?" The insufferable smirk was still in place. "I'll just have to give you a detention." He casually polished the gleaming silver prefect badge on his chest.

Professor Heiderich grabbed Harry's fist before it could connect with Malfoy's jaw, and moved between the two.

"I'd leave the compartment, if I were you." Heiderich narrowed his eyes at the other blond, who had by now drawn his wand.

"How are you going to make me, first year?" A vein on Heiderich's forehead twitched. The next moment, Malfoy was on the ground. Harry had blinked and so had nearly missed it. From what he could tell, Heiderich had snaked his left arm around Malfoy's wand-arm, and had made a violent twisting motion. The wand had gone flying, and Malfoy himself had been flung (not without a startled cry) nearly one hundred and eighty degrees up and around, above the Professor's head, to land behind him.

"I could have you expelled for that!" Malfoy snarled up at his attacker without even taking a moment to compose himself. "Attacking a prefect; you'll be back on this train before you're even sorted!" He hissed, groping around for his wand.

"No, you won't." Heiderich said curtly as Alphonse picked up the fallen wand beside him. "I believe that the word of a professor is taken over the word of a student – especially one who thinks he can bully those… younger than him."

Malfoy gaped at him. "You—you're not – you can't be the –"

Heiderich's glare said, '_Who are you calling so short he can't even be a preschool teacher?!',_ but what he actually said was: "I assure you, I am." His glare solidified. "Now get out. Take your friends with you." Crabbe and Goyle, like the useless bumps-on-a-log they were, had stayed still and silent throughout most of the exchange (save for a few deep guffaws to punctuate Malfoy's earlier taunts), as Malfoy hadn't instructed them for the instance in which they would have to defend him against unruly teachers.

"My wand—" Malfoy began.

"You'll get it back on the first day of class." Heiderich said, taking it from his son and placing it somewhere up his right sleeve. "Until then…" He trailed off and sat down, closing his eyes again and pointedly ignoring the Slytherin. The message was clear; 'you're not a threat.'

Malfoy made a short noise like one that an angry cat would make and left, pushing past Crabbe and Goyle, who trundled after him, several steps behind.

The door had barely slid shut before it was opened – again. This time, the visitors were more welcome. "Was that Malfoy we just saw slinking off in disgrace?" Ron asked as he and Hermione squeezed into the crowded compartment. The tall Weasley had a somewhat malicious grin splitting his face. "'Bout time someone showed him. Was that you, Harry?"

Harry frowned. "I wish. It was the Professor." He was on two minds on that subject. On the one hand, his inner child was maliciously clapping its' hands in glee at seeing Malfoy so trumped – on the other hand, he'd been … rescued… by the professor. Rescued! Him! The Boy-Who-Lived! On that note, he also felt quite indignant.

There was a creative reshuffling of seats to make room for the two new prefects; Al ended up sitting in his father's lap, and Neville's _Mimbulus mimbletonia_ was carefully placed on the floor.

"My name is Hermione Granger, Professor." Hermione smiled. "This is Ron Weasley." She indicated the redhead sitting to her left, who had already snagged a few chocolate frogs from Harry, and was happily munching away.

The blond man nodded. "I'm Professor Heiderich. And this is Alphonse." The latter was distracted by the third new addition to the compartment: Hermione's cat. She had just released Crookshanks from his carrying basket, and Al had immediately gravitated off the professor's lap and towards the creature. To the surprise of all those who had previously been acquainted with the burly feline, the cat didn't seem to mind the young boy's enthusiastic petting, and even … purred. It was a deep, gravelly purr, more suited to a tiger than the supposed housecat it was, but a purr nonetheless.

"His name is Crookshanks," the bushy-haired cat-owner offered.

"He's such a beautiful creature!" Al gushed in kitty-induced happiness.

Ron and Harry exchanged looks. "Beautiful" wasn't the word most would use to describe Hermione's familiar.

"Nii-san…" Al turned towards the professor, impeaching.

"No, Al." The elder headed off the predictable question. "You can't keep him."

Alphonse looked crestfallen for a moment, and then gave the cat one last pat before returning to his previous seat.

The train-ride continued in the usual manner after that. The only change from the usual routine for the Gryffindors was the young child asking questions, in the manner that young children presented with something knew often do, about everything from Bertie Botts Every Flavour Beans to owl post to galleons to the uniform differences between Hogwarts houses. Even Heiderich seemed interested in the answers, though he didn't venture any questions of his own. If one didn't know any better, one would think that the child was asking for them both.

* * *

By the time the Hogwarts Express rolled into Hogsmeade station, the sky outside was darkening, not just with the sinking sun, but also with brooding dark storm clouds. The steam rolling over the crowd of students from the hissing train sitting on the platform only added to the gloomy atmosphere. This was offset, however, by the general feeling of excitement that the students exuded from meeting up with old friends and beginning a new school year. 

The platform itself was crowded as usual. There wasn't much any student could do but follow the pressing flow of people towards the "horseless" carriages. Professor Heiderich was clutching the hand of his son so they wouldn't be separated in the crowd, and the kid was pressed right up against the left side of the professor's brown cloak. Somehow, the group that had shared the compartment with them managed to stay together.

"What the hell are those?" Heiderich had stopped short at the sight of the carriages. Harry was just about to ask what he meant when he, too, caught a glimpse of the no-longer horseless carriages.

The creatures pulling it had perhaps been horses, in a previous life. Demonic horses, with great bat wings and left to starve until they were nothing but leather stretched thinly over bony sharp skeletons, with patches of scraggly fur dripping down their necks. Bulging eyes, white, as if covered by cataracts, stared out in the gloom at the assembling students.

"What are you on about?" Asked Ron, halfway into a carriage. The redhead leaned back a bit to follow both Harry and the Professor's horrified gazes, but shrugged and continued into the vehicle when he saw nothing.

"They're Thestrals," murmured Luna from her place slightly behind the group. "You can only see them after you've seen someone die."

Harry swallowed, closing his eyes. Flickers of green light played across the inside of his eyelids and the half-remembered sound of a brave and honest Hufflepuff falling to the ground echoed in his ears.

"Who did you see?" Asked Luna, mildly, of the still and silent Heiderich pair. The child's hand clutched almost painfully his elder's left. The Professor's face was stony, but his eyes were sorrowful. Ginny and Hermione paused before getting in, to listen.

"Mother… it was Mother we saw die." Alphonse finally whispered, faintly. Heiderich looked down at the child solemnly, before they both entered the vehicle.

Nothing more could be said to that. The ride up to the castle was silent but for the thundering of invisible hooves, heard by none but those with painful memories they once again were to relive.

* * *

Author's Note: Haha! XD I'm proud of having avoided the cliché crossover meeting of the groups of characters "because all the other compartments are full"! XD So there! 

I also want to thank all of you who chose to review. :) You're all made of sheer awesomeness. I noticed that there was one question that kept popping up - if Ed is the DADA teacher, then what does that make Umbridge? Well, you shall find out in the next chapter, as soon as I have it written... which will have to wait until after vacation, and depending upon my university workload, could be a month or two. The chapter, above, was the last complete chapter I'd written in advance, so you guys will just have to be patient! Sorry! I'd absolutely love it if you all chose to review again - it would be a wonderful end to my trip to Maui to come back home and find a load of reviews. :)

Also, regarding what happened in 1923: not telling. :P I find that people's imaginations fill in the gap much better than I'd ever be able to. Just know that firewhisky does strange things to the mind. :3

**_Careful: I make mention of "Deathly Hallows" spoilers, here. Ignore if you have not yet finished!_**

But I seriously hope that this wasn't too bad in comparison to the _awesomeness_ that was "**Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows**"! ("Nooo! Dobby! D: ) Who's death do you most mourn, dearest reviewers? I don't know about you, but I'm most happy that Hagrid survived! Plus, y'know, Harry Potter himself. Totally didn't expect that, actually.


	4. Chapter Three: The Expository Flashback

**Chapter three: in which there is an expository flashback **

**Three Years Prior**

England was much too _wet_, Edward decided, huddling under the convenient eaves of a debilitated hotel in London's downtown core. He didn't remember the London on the other side of the Gate being so wet. Then again, he had only spent a brief amount of time there, and he had been _understandably_ distracted by various things.

He had picked London out of all places to flee to simply because it was the only name he recognized on the map outside of Amestris. In that respect, the Gate was actually good for something after all, surprisingly enough. Edward discovered upon their arrival (after stowing away twice on shipping trucks, riding three times on top of a train and once in a caboose to make their way from the Amestrian border across mainland Europe, as well as a memorable trip across the English Channel involving a succession of row boats, a parasail, two dolphins, a sea turtle and a very long section of transmuted rope) that the language spoken in England was completely different from the Amestrian he knew.

However, despite the fact that the two languages were as dissimilar as could be (more so than Freon and Iron), it was easily intelligible by Edward. It took him a bare five minutes of exposure to the native speakers to figure it out: the Gate. Its' chief purpose was to give information, after all, and when he had passed through the Gate to the alternate London he had acquired knowledge of the English language.

Alphonse, however, did not have the same comprehension as he did; or at least as far as Edward could tell. His brother's body was now at the estimated age of around fourteen months, and he had great difficulty making himself coherent. Apparently babbling had an actual purpose – it was how one learnt how to make the sounds necessary for speaking. It hadn't occurred to Edward until this point in his life just how complicated the action of talking actually was: all those subtle tongue movements.

Ed could tell that it frustrated his little brother to no end that he couldn't make himself understandable. That made Al all the more "talkative", practicing babbling down to an art, perfecting each sound until the day he could re-create his whole repertoire.

Currently, Alphonse had a "vocabulary" of perhaps twenty "words", including but not limited to: "Nii-san", "Roz" (for Rose) and a sort of "zzhap!" noise (by which he meant something along the lines of "just transmute something!"). He could even strategically manage the odd "mama" when confronted with cooing women. That greatly aided them both, as it tended to loosen both their heartstrings and purse strings, especially when the aforementioned women found out that the two were homeless.

Ed had found it nearly impossible to find an apartment in London that he could both afford to rent and that would accept him without a valid passport or even birth-certificate: having the knowledge of the entire vocabulary and grammatical structure of the English language did not a native speaker make. He still spoke with a pronounced accent that he normally passed off as German. He was getting better, although he couldn't yet get to the point of being able to pass himself off as a native of Britain; hence, people asking for passports as proof of citizenship. He had none. Therefore, he was an illegal alien and no decent landlord would touch him.

At least Rose and her son Cain were still in Amestris. It would be even more difficult to find accommodations for four than it would be for two. After two weeks of instruction with her (which Edward referred to as "baby boot camp" in the depths of his mind), he had given her enough money for a train ticket and had seen her off to Risembool. It was the least he could have done, after she had taught him how to keep Al alive in his fragile state. Besides, it would be suspicious if the only witness to their death disappeared so soon after being interrogated.

In any case, even for two, the best he could manage for living accommodations was fixing up an old car he'd found abandoned in the countryside. The rust had been so deeply engrained in the metal that he'd had to use alchemy to remove it, and the engine had been a lost cause to begin with. _That_ had been his most expensive purchase: a working car engine. Edward could not even attempt to learn his way around the complexities of a car's innards- a mechanical geek, he was not. His knowledge pertaining to metals was very good, especially in the field of transforming them from one form to another, but begin speaking to him about carburetors and regulators and pistons and he was lost.

He wasn't a rocket scientist, after all.

And that engine had cost them a lot of money: which meant a lot of cute, watery looks from Alphonse to solicit donations.

Of course, that wasn't to say that the two depended completely on the charity of lonely women. Oh, no: they were in a country that had little to no history of alchemists, which meant that there were little to no laws regulating alchemy. That meant that transmuting gold was no longer highly illegal.

Obviously, Edward was careful never to make too much, and never anything too high-grade. That was what gave away most alchemists, anyway: making gold too pure. As long as one added a few impurities, transmuted gold was very hard to identify, as several unscrupulous alchemists that Edward had investigated during his military career had failed to discover before they were arrested.

Just because it wasn't _illegal_, per se, didn't mean that unwanted attention was welcome. Hence the pseudonym: Heiderich. One couldn't even spell it properly in the Amestrian alphabet. The longer they could elude the knowledge of the Amestrian government, the better. Ideally? Forever. There was no way that Edward would allow Alphonse to fall into the hands of unscrupulous State Alchemists, eager to examine the product of a human transmutation powered by a Philosopher's Stone... Especially not now that they'd finally achieved their dream. Maybe Alphonse was... smaller... than before, but he could feel things now, taste things, and gain some sort of enjoyment in life. They had done what nobody else (well, with the possible exception of Dante and their own father) could: they had turned back time.

And it was Edward's brotherly duty to see that Alphonse had the best childhood he could possibly have.

That was one of the reasons Edward was so frustrated at the moment. It was miserably wet and chilly out, and the last thing he wanted was for Alphonse to catch a cold. Their rusted out car had only a flimsy canvas roof - nothing to keep out the rain or the cold at night. And most hotels didn't accept lumps of gold as payment. To try to recreate enough spare change to pay for even a night's stay was more work than it was worth, and Edward had taken one look at the paper money of Great Britain and decided against even trying. He was an alchemist, not an artist. Alphonse was much better at transmuting such minute details than he was, and currently Alphonse hadn't yet relearned how to hold a stick of chalk properly.

That was the reason for their current state of "homelessness."

Edward was stalling. He figured that if the old man at the desk saw that he was serious about staying all night outside in the freezing rain with a young child rather than pay the excessive "fee" for being in the country without legal documentation to have the "privilege" of staying at this "fine establishment", then he might recant and let the two of them in.

Of course, "fine establishment" was being used in the loosest sense. It looked structurally unsound to Edward's "professional" eye. He was experienced in making buildings fall down.

Edward shifted his weight a little bit to shield his brother form the rain a bit more. Alphonse was starting to fuss and wriggle. Mercifully, Alphonse was a quiet baby. He always was the more considerate of the two brothers.

A brisk gust of wind sent ripples across the puddle in front of him, and various pieces of litter scuttled along the sidewalk. A surprisingly unsoggy newspaper drifted along the gutter, lodging on an outcropped cobble near Edward's feet.

This gave Ed an idea. Perhaps he could get a job. Newspapers ran "help wanted" ads, didn't they? Edward was fairly certain on that point. Not that he'd ever had to apply for a job before. People came to _him_, back in Amestris. He mentally slapped himself. Focus.

Leaning down, he plucked the paper from the water with one gloved hand. He scanned the top copy. "The London Tribune", eh? He blinked, his eyes having difficulty reading the text blurred by rain and poor light. Wait. Where had he read "The London Tribune"? The newspaper's name was clearly "The Daily Prophet". The rain must have been getting in his eyes. Shifting Alphonse slightly on his hip, he unfolded the newspaper.

It was strange.

The format wasn't what was unusual – there were the usual bold-texted headlines, catchy adverts and blurbs on sports news. The bizarre thing was the _content_: the headline screamed**: Balleycastle Bats in the running for Quidditch World Cup**!

The most prominent of the advertisements was for a book signing at a bookstore called "Flourish and Blotts"… and okay, that was creepy. The photograph of a man with extremely shiny teeth hadn't just… winked at him, had it? Photographs didn't move, didn't they? Well, they admittedly had fairly advanced technology outside of Amestris. He'd thought that the computer had been a joke until he'd seen one in action. Why not photographs, then?

Because it was a frivolous waste, his mind supplied. What was the point of it?

Or, rather, his scientific mind piped up, a more interesting question to ask would be: how the heck did they manage to create these kind of photographs?

"What do you think, Al?" he asked his brother, pointing out the frantically winking blond man in one advert. His brother shook his head in an infantile gesture of bafflement. "'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.'" Edward recited. "Well, this sure does look like magic to me."

The paper also made frequent references to "witches" and "wizards". Now, Edward's spoken English was a little shaky, but he knew that there were only a few narrow definitions for those words. Something strange niggled at the back of his brain. He _knew_ this…

Edward then recognized the feeling. It was the same one he got when he was using information the Gate had given him: false memories. Often, he didn't even realize that he had them until he found himself thinking something very matter-of-factly that he shouldn't have known in the first place. He had freaked out the bastard Colonel once by absent-mindedly doodling a more efficient flame array than the one the man had on his gloves in the margins of one of his reports. Edward had never studied atmospheric transmutations in his life, but knew more than the basics simply due to the information that the Gate had provided him with.

Edward suspected that the information came from every alchemist who had ever come into contact with the Gate. That would explain his huge knowledge base regarding human transmutation, which was above and beyond what he and his brother had been studying before "that night." It sat at the back of his mind whenever he had thought of how to get his brother's body back.

Such was the case now, with this "magic". That was the single most prominent reason that he didn't dismiss its existence out of hand.

But there was a little coupon in the corner of the paper: **Valid for ONE** **Free Dinner at the Leaky Cauldron: your portal into Britain's most popular back-to-Hogwarts shopping district!**

What was wrong with a free meal? Turning to look at his brother on his hip, Edward asked: "Well, what do you think, Al? Shall we get some free food?" Al gurgled. That was as close as he could get to an affirmative answer. Good.

Luckily, the paper had directions and a tiny helpful map ("**For the muggleborns among us!**") which seemed to change direction to orient itself in the way that Edward was facing at the time, so he didn't have to turn the paper around to have it in the proper direction when confronted by intersections.

Quickly enough (sometimes Edward loved motor vehicles, even if they were more trouble than they were worth most of the time), the alchemists found themselves driving along a small shopping street. Edward could see the darkened windows of some sort of bookstore, and almost drove right past the pub. He pulled his rickety car over when he read "The Leaky Cauldron" out of the corner of his eye. It didn't _look_ particularly friendly, but hey, beggars can't be choosers. Besides, the two had spent many more nights in shiftier places when he had been working for the military. Being a state alchemist was still synonymous with being an animal in some towns, so Edward had often been confronted with the "you may as well sleep in the gutter, military dog!" mentality. So he had, indeed, slept in worse places. If he was provided with a (hopefully free) meal and a roof over their heads, he'd be content.

Without the slightest bit of trepidation, the young man, infant brother in tow, opened the door to the magical world.

It didn't look particularly magical. It was grimier than one would expect. The décor of the entire building favored worn, smoke-stained wood, and seemed stuck in the late seventeenth century or thereabouts. This look was only accentuated by the clothing of the few patrons up this late (or early, one might say, after considering the time). Considering that Edward's Amestrian-style clothing was also out of date with the modern British world (although only by one century, not four), he wasn't _as_ out of place as he could have been.

In any case, he shoved his awkwardness down and strode with confidence down to the bar, ignoring the smoky smell of pipe weed and other, less recognizable scents. When in doubt, act like you know what you're doing. Even if you're worried you'll get infected by their crazy. And if there was anything Ed had copious amounts of, it was confidence. He oozed it – he was the _Fullmetal Alchemist_ after all. He'd achieved his life's goal at the age of sixteen. He was _confident_. His body language declared that he was completely at home here.

"Excuse me," the alchemist said, tapping one gloved automail finger against the worn and scarred wood of the bar to catch the attention of the balding barkeep. "Is this coupon still valid?" He held out the paper. Alphonse gurgled quietly.

The hairless employee looked from Edward, to the child in his arms, to the newspaper. "Why, of course!" He declared after a slight pause. Edward had the feeling that he was lying, but hey, he wasn't above using the "pity me" factor if it got him and Alphonse free food. "I thought that we'd all run out of these; this print run was months ago. Well, no matter. It's served its purpose. What will you have?"

"What do you have available?" The younger man countered smoothly.

"Hows about some shepherd's pie for you, and some nice pumpkin mash for your child?" The man asked, smiling and revealing his missing teeth.

"That would be wonderful." Edward concluded.

"And what would you like to drink? Milk? Butterbeer? Or something stronger?"

Edward made a face. "No milk, please. I'm lactose intolerant. I'll… have a butterbeer." Best to sound sure of himself.

"Right you are, then. It will all be out in ten minutes."

Edward smiled as he sat down at the bar, shifting Alphonse to sit in his lap so the younger boy could see over the counter.

"Lactose intolerance": it really was a wonderful excuse. Most people looked at him, an "adult" strangely if he professed to not liking milk. Apparently when you were grown up you were just supposed to swallow your pride and ignore your taste buds and eat food that you hated. But if he stated that he was lactose intolerant, well then, of _course_ there was no way he could drink milk. Excellent, excellent.

As he waited with Alphonse for his food, he casually observed the other patrons. As already noted, their clothing was several centuries "out of date," but that wasn't the sole thing that looked "out of place" to Edward's eye. Or, rather, "sounded." The murmurs of the patrons didn't always sound like English, but as often as not contained what sounded like Latin words or phrases. After a little while, Edward concluded that this was how they did "magic". He had just seen one tiny, hairy old lady in a balaclava transmute a teacup into a hedgehog with a wave of a small stick and a muttered Latin word, apparently to prove a point to the larger but equally hairy man sitting across from her.

There was a surprising amount of through-traffic considering the time of night. After a minute of observing, he noticed that many of those who came in through the same door as he had were also wearing strangely cobbled together clothing, like they had _seen_ pictures of what those in the rest of London wore, but didn't understand how the clothing went together. Even Edward with his limited experience knew that men didn't often wear pink nightgowns.

"Right then, here you are, sir!" The barkeep's cheerful voice distracted Edward from his observing. Upon setting eyes upon the plates in front of him, his stomach reminded him that he hadn't eaten in nearly a whole day. Al had, though (he wouldn't let anyone tell him that he was an irresponsible guardian), but it had still been several hours since the infant's last meal.

Edward fed Alphonse first, of course. He had been provided with a small bowlful of orangey-yellow coloured mash. It almost looked like sweet potato, but Edward recalled that it was pumpkin. Interesting. After sampling a bit himself (the Fullmetal Alchemist didn't mind sacrificing himself for his brother) and finding it un-poisoned and actually rather tasty, he switched spoons and began to feed Al.

Alphonse put up with the indignities of being an infant with the mind of an eighteen year old surprisingly well – being spoon-fed, changed, bathed and carried with very little complaint. Edward didn't know how he'd react if he were in Alphonse's place. Ever since… the incident and the subsequent surgeries, he'd developed a violent dislike of being treated as an invalid (even if he, admittedly, actually was one).

Alphonse was very good at keeping still and neatly accepting the food offered to him. As such, Edward never compromised his brother's dignity by making "airplane noises" and so forth, meant to entice the child to eat. He had seen other, er, caretakers do that to their children, but it wasn't necessary with Alphonse.

Once Alphonse was sufficiently fed (and Edward had wiped off the remains of the pumpkin mash from boy's face with a serviette), Edward ate his own meal.

The shepherd's pie was absolutely delicious. Hunger, they say, is the best sauce. Alphonse poked his elder brother in the ribs for being rude by eating the food too quickly, but there was no malice in the motion.

After they had both sated their hunger, the blond alchemist once more addressed the barkeep. "Do you have rooms?"

"We do indeed, sir." The man replied, still polishing a grimy drink glass. "Just for the night then?"

"I think that we will be staying for a bit longer than that. Do you accept gold as payment?" He asked, casually.

"Yes, yes, of course. Who doesn't?" The man smirked, revealing a gold tooth. Edward nodded, almost politely, for him.

Edward Elric was really beginning to like this magical world. Free meals, accepting gold from alchemists: excellent!

* * *

The next morning, Edward, with brother in his arms, descended the stairwell from the small hotel room to the bar in which he had eaten last night. Apparently, the bartender didn't sleep, as it was the same man behind the counter this morning as it had been late last night. Perhaps he took strategic naps when there were fewer customers. The alchemist approached the counter, confidently sidestepping through the breakfast crowd. He was still shorter than most of these wizards, he noted with displeasure. Well, they were all just freakishly tall. They probably used some sort of frivolous magic spell to get that way.

"Is there a bank of some sort, around here?" Edward asked the bartender, casual as can be. Most banks didn't turn away lumps of gold, provided he could come up with a good back-story for having them in his possession in the first place. A gurgling Alphonse usually helped his case when it was a female teller.

"You'd be wanting Gringotts, then, in the Alley." The barkeep replied as he polished his ever-present grimy glass.

"The Alley." Ed repeated, nonchalantly. "Could you direct me to it?""Just go straight through that door," the man pointed to what looked to be a back-door, "And tap the third brick to the right, two above from the rubbish bin with your wand."

"My wand… I see." Ed nodded. "I've… lost my wand. It's why I'm here, you see, to…" he trailed off the sentence meaningfully. Most of the time, people filled in what they expected to hear.

"Ah, yes, Ollivanders! He's the best wand-maker in all England, and probably the whole of Europe. I suppose you want to see if he lives up to his reputation? I assure you, he does!" The man withdrew a short stick from his apron. "Eleven inches, oak, phoenix feather core, good for charms. Served me well for nigh forty years." Edward nodded, as if interested, and stated that it did, indeed, look like an excellent wand.

So these wizards used these wands to make their spells work, eh? Good to know.

"Here, I'll open the entrance for you." Nodding his thanks to the bartender, Edward followed him to the entrance to the Alley. For all that it was supposed to be the Gateway to the Wizarding World, it really did just look like a scruffy back-alley. The young man made note of the brick that the barkeep tapped with his wand. As soon as the man did so, the bricks began rearranging themselves, unaided, to form an archway where there had only been a wall made of brick and mortar before. Edward raised an eyebrow. Impressive. It did indeed look to be magic. Something once again rang in the back of his mind. Yes. This definitely felt familiar… and real. Or at least, real according to the Gate's twisted logic. Shrugging, he once again thanked the barkeeper and headed off into the Alley.

Alphonse, held against Ed's shoulder so his head only just peeked over them, gave a small infantile wave. The young child was delighted to see the old man give a small wave back before going back inside, presumably to continue cleaning the glasses. Al liked it when people waved back.

Diagon Alley, to put it simply, was an amazing place. Edward had the hardest time simply trying to appear as if he knew what everything was, when in reality, he recognized next to nothing and was amazed by everything. Alphonse, the lucky boy, was permitted to have one of those wide-eyed looks so often seen on young children. It didn't help Edward that everyone here seemed to find incredibly tall, pointy hats fashionable, making it even more difficult for him to see the sights. Damned freakishly tall magic people.

It was incredibly crowded, however, so Edward had to keep a careful hold upon Alphonse. He would have just loved to run into all of these shops to examine all of their stock minutely, like a little child. However, he knew that he had to be practical. He had to get some proper currency before he did anything.

Luckily, Gringotts was actually incredibly difficult to miss. Imposing marble buildings have a tendency to do that. Hurrying through the crowds with the ease of practice, Edward jogged up the steps to the wizarding bank. He passed by the warning engraved on the doors, only just barely pausing to read the words. After he had, he dismissed them from his thoughts. He didn't have to steal anything from the place. He had _other_ ways of getting around his money problems, after all. Alchemy is ever so useful.

He had an incredible shock when he saw just who was manning the bank, and thought irrationally, for a moment, that someone had created and bred some incredibly strange chimeras… but he suppressed his initial disgust and scientific curiosity when he noticed that no-one normal-looking was treating the creatures as anything unusual. He couldn't look out of place, here. Alphonse continued to look wide-eyed at everything

He overheard some of the patrons in front of him in line refer to the creature as "goblins" – in connection with the words "greedy gold-coveting goblin bastards". Edward decided to hold off judgment on them until he interacted with them personally.

The goblins were satisfyingly quick in analyzing the grade of his gold and exchanging it for some of this new currency, and were rather polite as they explained the denominations for him. Having the image of a "foreigner" certainly seemed to help him whenever he had to reveal his ignorance in certain areas without arousing suspicion.

It would have been even more impressive had they realized that the gold lumps he had given them had originally been lead, but as they were for all intents and purposes chemically gold at the moment, he didn't blame them for accepting it as the real thing. They did comment on its relatively good quality, though, and gave him a grand total of forty-nine galleons and thirteen sickles. Edward could only assume that this was a good deal (more so for him, as he had made his part of the bargain from scrap metal, but they didn't need to know that).

And thus, the two brothers were free to wander Diagon Alley with some actual spending money.

Their first stop should come as no surprise: Flourish and Blott's bookstore.

Perhaps it was his scholarly instincts, but Edward could _swear_ he could smell the books from halfway down the street. As anyone who frequents libraries would know, large collections of books are commonly accompanied by the distinct odor of dust, paper and human curiosity.

His brother certainly had no objections to their destination.

The place was simply full to the bursting with books. Identical grins spread upon both brother's faces. "Where shall we begin, Al?" Edward asked, casually. Giving a shrug, the younger brother simply pointed in a random direction. That way was as good as any. They set off to bask in literature.

They ended up staying for four hours in Flourish & Blott's. During that time, they both had learned much about the Wizarding world. The Elrics were careful to remain inconspicuous; Alphonse would casually make grabbing motions towards a book he wanted to read, and Edward would show it to him like an indulgent older relative. After examining the book with his pudgy baby hands, Al would either reject it or coo in such a way that would make it impossible for Edward to refuse him. They would read them in detail once they got back to their private rooms.

That wasn't to say that they didn't do any detailed reading while there, oh no. Alphonse had an excellent view of whatever books his elder brother was holding from his place on Edward's shoulders. His commentary upon their contents would have to wait until he was a little bit older and a little bit better at forming coherent words.

The Elrics were actually surprised that they were allowed to read for so long. Some bookstore owners that they had run across before were very adamant that their stores were not libraries.

Perhaps they – or, rather, the older Elric – emitted a scholarly air that didn't allow interruption. They _were_ going to be buying things at the end of the day, in any case; their pile of soon-to-be purchases grew by the hour.

Wizards were absolutely _fascinating. _For all their illogic, they managed to compile some very interesting theories upon the nature of the universe and of magic itself. Some of it he recognized from his memories from the Gate, other bits he knew from Alchemical theory. They were apparently related in some small way; the alchemist suspected the Gate. Everything always came back to the Gate, unfortunately for him.

This theory of his was only substantiated by the fact that he, who should by all rights be a "muggle", as they called non-magical people, had been quite capable of reading The Daily Prophet newspaper despite its "muggle notice-me-not" charms. He had also been able to spot The Leaky Cauldron without the aid of another wizard. Edward had been informed by one of the books (A Brief History of Wizarding Britain by Galinda Alouion) that even the parents of muggle-born witches and wizards must be accompanied by someone of magical training so that they could even _see _The Leaky Cauldron.

Thus, Edward determined, he was likely a… wizard. Or, at least, a person capable of performing magic. From what he had observed so far, Edward didn't think that he was crazy and illogical enough to actually be a wizard. Still, it was an intriguing thought nonetheless.

Yes, he really _would_ have to acquire a wand at some point. It would be interesting to see this magic of theirs in action up close. He was certain that his brother was equally curious. The Elrics both had scientific minds. Everything _must_ have an explanation behind it, however deep down and hidden.

If nothing else, the Wizarding bank that they had found would be an excellent source of exchange for his fabricated gold. He may even be able to put off acquiring an actual job for a few years yet!

He steadied Alphonse on his shoulders with his automail hand (it had a very limited range of motion now, because he hadn't had a chance to have Winry look at it since it was broken by Wrath), and picked up his basket of books in the other. At the till, he pretended not to notice that the female cashier didn't charge him full price for some of the books. She was understandably distracted by Alphonse's sheer, well, adorableness. Al, on his part, did his best to give endearing smiles over his older brother's hair.

Once their purchases had been duly wrapped, Edward stepped out with his brother onto Diagon Alley once more. Still standing in front of the bookstore, he looked up and down the shopping street. Edward glanced at his younger brother. "So, Al? Where to?" Alphonse shrugged. Having no real preference either, Edward headed off to see what all the fuss was about regarding this Ollivander person's wands.

There wasn't any rush.

They now had a whole new world to explore, after all.

* * *

Author's Note: So what prompted this? Weren't you all just waiting for the opening feast, and maybe the first day of classes? Why is the author shaking things up like this?

Well, here's my answer: I realize that I'm just too darn subtle for my own good. I like to imply things in my writing. I implied that Edward just happened across England, happened across the magical world, happened to still have his automail... but then I realized (with the help of you reviewers) that well, sometimes you have to actually outright state something to make sense. So this was the obligatory explanatory flashback chapter! I actually wasn't originally going to have this, and just leave much of it implicit in the way I told the story, but I suppose there's such a thing as too much subtlety. I also dislike huge hunks of exposition as a rule, but I think I've done a fair job at making it enjoyable to read. Agree? Disagree? Plus, I wanted to have more cuteness with an infant Alphonse. I'm sure we all did.

There have been many people who have asked me in reviews "does Ed still have his automail?" Again, perhaps I was far too subtle for my own good. I figured that, since Ed's life goal up until the prologue had been to restore Al's body and his own limbs, he'd have made a big deal if he _had_ gotten his real arm and leg back… but as there was no such "ZOMG I can feel stuff with my arm and leg!" moments, that people would gather that he still had his automail. I think I also made a few mentions of them… maybe? D: I'm too subtle! I'm sure that this chapter makes it clearer, however.

In any case, I also want to apologize for the long wait for this update! Things have been… hectic lately, especially with university (three papers due over the course of a week and a half in November!), as well as National Novel Writing Month. I won that, by the way; I reached 60,000 words in 30 days, in fact. :)


	5. Chapter Four:Feast, First Day, Interlude

**Chapter Four; it is decided that wizards are generally out-of-shape **_**(oh, and **__**there are **__**fireworks)

* * *

**_

The Great Hall was filled with the excited murmurs of the Hogwarts students: friends calling out to friends across the tables, girls giggling about summer romances amongst themselves, even a few slacking students frantically finishing up some homework they had neglected to do over the summer. In short, it was a normal setting for the Opening Feast.

Harry, Ron and Hermione were quite happy at the Gryffindor table, chatting with both each other and their housemates, until Harry spotted something unusual. Well, more unusual than the "transparent" ceiling, floating candles, and the fact that they used wooden sticks to turn teacups into hedgehogs. No, they were used to those things. Those things, in their own strange ways, were _normal_.

What caught Harry's eye was someone sitting at the head table: one toad-like woman that was strangely familiar. With a cold feeling in his gut, he pointed her out to his two seating companions.

"Hey, that's the horrid woman who was at my hearing!" Both Ron and Hermione looked up at that. That "horrid woman" seemed to be addressing Heiderich, whom she was sitting beside, with a disapproving expression on her face. Not that Harry had ever seen her wear more than two expressions: disapproving and sickly sweet niceness. The latter was almost worse than the former. The blond man had edged over in his seat as far away from her as he could get.

"Don't worry – we met the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher on the train, remember? Professor Heiderich?"

"Yeah, so what's she doing here? There aren't any missing teachers! Well, Trelawney isn't here, but that's not all that unusual…"

They didn't have to wait too long for the answer, as just then Dumbledore tapped his empty wineglass with a metal teaspoon. Thus assuring that all attention was on him, the Headmaster stood to address the student body.

"Welcome to another year at Hogwarts." Although his long white beard obscured much of Dumbledore's lower face (and indeed, most of his torso), it was not difficult to see the smile of welcome on his face. "I'll just make few introductions before we dig into the scrumptious that has no doubt been lovingly prepared for us-"

_"Slave labour!" _Hermione hissed in disapproval just above a quiet whisper.

"I was fortunate enough this year to once again find a highly-qualified person to teach Defence Against the Dark Arts. Please welcome Professor Heiderich."

The aforementioned Professor stood and waved, a little awkwardly, as the student body applauded.

"Accompanying him is young Alphonse Heiderich. Please give him a warm welcome as well." The boy, thus introduced, stood on his chair and gave a tentative wave to his "audience," who applauded once again.

"In addition, we have another new face at our table…One Dolores Umbridge." There was another round of polite applause, noticeably less enthusiastic than the two that had come before. Umbridge simply wasn't as cute as a four-year-old child, after all. It couldn't be helped.

Of course, what she said in her little speech didn't do her any favours either. "Hem hem – Yes." The woman cleared her throat in a fashion that was already intrinsically annoying. Any hopes that she might have had for a positive first impression were not realized because of what she said next: "I am Dolores Umbridge, the Ministry of Magic's representative at Hogwarts. It has come to our attention that certain values that all wizards and witches should hold dear have been… waylaid by the current climate at Hogwarts. My task is to act as mediator in school disputes and to establish a ministry presence in these hallowed halls. My title is the Hogwarts High Inquisitor, but you may address me as Miss Umbridge. Any student should feel free to speak to me about any… concerns that they may have about their… education." Her wide mouth stretched into a smile that reminded many in the audience distinctly of a bullfrog, waiting for a fly. She sat down.

There was a flurry of speculative murmurs among the students followed that little speech. Hermione, for one, was indignant: "She wasn't even _trying_ to be diplomatic! This is just a ruse so that the ministry can have more control over Dumbledore!"

"What did she _mean, '_High Inquisitor'?" asked Ron.

"She _means_ that she's here to cover up the fact that Voldemort has returned." Harry muttered sullenly. Ron found himself nodding in agreement.

What had been clearly implied in her speech was the fact that she was undermining Dumbledore's power as headmaster. Evidently, he wasn't trusted by the Ministry of Magic to run his own school.

The students, of course, hadn't been the only ones to listen to this speech. As the woman in pink sat back down, the two other new members at the staff table, the Elrics, shared a glance. The woman had already won their animosity before the announcements, as she had criticized Edward for raising a young boy on his own without any feminine influence. Edward dreaded to think of what she might consider "feminine influence". He thought that he had been doing rather well, all considering, raising his little brother. Alphonse certainly told him so. Who was this Umbridge woman to tell him any differently?

* * *

It was the first day of classes. As usual, there was an excited murmuring as the first Defence Against the Dark class of the day filed into the classroom – what would their new professor be like? Would he be competent and actually teach them defence and offense, or just assign a bunch of reading like Lockhart? Was he as smart as he was handsome? (The last thought was voiced by a predominantly female population).

Rumours had swiftly abounded regarding the handsome new Defence Against the Dark Arts professor. It was known that he was a widower (it was said that both had seen the death of the child's mother), but _how _the woman had died was the subject of much speculation. Some said he was a German prince (no doubt fuelled by his slight, but recognizable accent) with an illegitimate son, on the run from his disapproving parents and the assassins they had sent. There was even one quietly whispered story, no doubt inspired by the length of his hair and his cherubic face, that _he_ was actually a _she_, a woman in disguise, a woman and her son trying to escape an abusive relationship…

The professor's apparent young age did nothing but encourage the girlish fantasies.

Unfortunately for that group, the classroom was empty of handsome professors upon their arrival. Fortunately for them, though, the professor's adorable son _was_ there.

Alphonse was seated behind the professor's desk (sitting on top of a pile of textbooks stacked upon a chair so that he could see above the table), drawing with a pencil on a large piece of paper. He looked quite tiny sitting behind the oversized desk, and when he looked up and smiled at those who entered, indiscriminate of Slytherins and Gryffindors, the hearts of the female population those houses' fifth year melted.

Parvati and Lavender were among the first few girls to approach, inquiring after what Alphonse was drawing in the tone of voice women use uniquely for talking to young children and small animals.

The boy looked slightly flustered at their attention, and began folding up his paper, murmuring, "Just circles," in a quiet voice. But the girls insisted, and several more students approached as well, encouraging him to show them what he was drawing.

Flushing, the youngest in the room briefly unfolded the paper. There was a glimpse of circles, yes, but what elaborate circles they were! Geometric shapes spiralled along the insides in complex patterns – a four year old had drawn these _freehand_? As soon as he had ascertained that those clustered around the desk had seen what he had drawn, he folded them up again and placed them in a drawer in the desk.

Without losing any of their momentum, the small horde of girls began asking him rapid-fire questions – most of them on the subject of his handsome father. How old was he? How old was Alphonse? What was the professor's first name? What was his favourite colour? His favourite food?

The girls did have some sense of propriety, however, and refrained from asking their most pressing question: '_is__ the professor single?'_ They did realize that even a child as young as Alphonse probably would understand the implications of the question – especially because it was regarding the absence of his mother.

In fact, Alphonse didn't answer any of the questions. He had shrunk back under the barrage of words, unable to get a word in between the brutal interrogation even if he had wanted to.

In any case, he was spared from answering when abruptly, the classroom door banged open, and their new Defence Professor strode in. "Alright, everybody sit down and shut up." The dramatic effect of this proclamation was somewhat weakened given that it was muffled by a piece of toast hanging half out of his mouth from breakfast.

Now, people are always told that first impressions are important. In a teacher's case, this is doubly so, because the first impression of the first class can determine one's whole teaching career. One must be firm and confident, but not off-putting. One mustn't alienate the students. One must make them interested in what you are going to teach them.

Well, he held their attention, all right, and certainly exuded confidence.

The murmurs of individual conversations died off, and the girls at the front returned to their seats. After gulping down the rest of the toast and brushing the crumbs off his lips, Heiderich began.

"All right, welcome to Defence Against the Dark Arts. You can call me Professor Heiderich." He didn't write it on the board. "I've been told that over the last four years you've gotten a very… varied curriculum taught to you by your other teachers." Several people in the class nodded.

"In any case, I don't care what you've been told about He-Whose-Name-Nobody-Cares-To-Say, or his supposed return. I'm here to teach you to defend yourselves." Heiderich was pacing back and forth at the front of the class. "I don't care if you believe you are on the brink or war or not. You _will_ use what I'm going to teach you, at some point in your lives." The Professor stopped and looked around the class, at the fifth year's faces. Those wearing red ties looked particularly grim, particularly a boy with messy hair and glasses. "My main focus this year will be teaching you what you can do should you find yourselves in a situation in which you cannot use magic. Oh, I'll teach you magical defence, too," he said quickly as many of the students shot glances at each other. "But by the time spring rolls around, you should be competent enough in hand-to-hand combat that you shouldn't have as much need to fear having your wand lost or destroyed in a combat situation."

"Hand-to-hand?" A girl wearing a green necktie made a face. "What use is that?

"I believe Mr. Malfoy knows the answer to that question." Many in the class twisted around to look at the sullen blond Slytherin in the back row. He glowered at any who looked his way.

"Think of it this way. Wizards typically attack using long-range spells." The professor resumed pacing across the front of the classroom. "Even if your opponent has a wand, if you can get within reach, you can disarm your opponent. It doesn't hurt to know both short-range and long-range attacks. A varied repertoire confuses your opponent; it makes you difficult to predict. Being unpredictable is good in battlefield situations." He looked around again. "Understand?" Some people nodded hesitantly. Many still looked slightly disbelieving.

"Put away your books." Heiderich ordered. "We're going outside."

Again, many students looked at each other in confusion. They did as they were told, however, and packed up their supplies. The teens followed their new professor out of the classroom, down several hallways and staircases (at one point they had to wait for the second half of the group, trapped by a set of stairs that had moved at an inopportune time), all the way down to the entrance hall and outside.

"Now then," Professor Heiderich said once all of his students were standing on the grass, blinking at the bright morning sun. "We're going to run laps."

Now all of the students wore surprised "_wait – what?!"_ expressions on their faces.

Their teacher continued on speaking, despite the incredulous looks he was getting. "We'll all run one lap around the school building, for today. Alphonse," he indicated his child, standing at his side, "Will be running ahead of you. He will lead the way; all you have to do is follow. You should be able to keep up with a four-year-old's legs." Heiderich smirked. It wasn't a very nice smirk. One could almost call it… malicious. "I'll be following behind the whole group in case someone decides to take a detour." Heiderich raised a golden eyebrow at a few students grumbling amongst themselves.

"Begin!" Alphonse left his side, running alongside the outer stonewall of the castle. Hearing very few people behind him, he twisted a little, waving and smiling. This got many of the girls in the class to follow him, and the boys followed suit.

The pace was relatively slow, because, embarrassingly, many members of the class actually _weren't_ capable of keeping up with a child whose leg span was less than two-thirds of theirs. It shouldn't have been as surprising as it was, Edward reflected. It seemed that the only real exercise that many of them got was running about the school and up and down staircases between classes. But he was missing a _leg_, and was in better shape than most of them!

They ran a single tour of the castle; it was all they had time for during that class. The perimeter of the building was barely two kilometres long, but before they'd even reached the halfway point, most of the class had given up on jogging and had begun to slowly plod along, gasping for breath. The ones who lasted the longest were Harry Potter and a few of the muggleborns.

It occurred to Edward that this would be harder than he'd thought. Izumi-sensei had started on beating the crap out of – er, 'teaching them martial arts' - nearly right away, but then again, they had been young and healthy from running around Risembool, and then from evading the masked man on Yock Island. One stayed fit or perished in the Curtis household. But these wizards were winded after a mere ten-minute jog! They weren't even running! They would have been _eaten_ by now, if Izumi-sensei were here. '_Probably a good thing she's not_,' Ed thought privately. '_She'd kill me too, for faking my death and not telling her. She always seems to find these things out_.'

He hid an involuntary shudder (it wouldn't do for a teacher to show weakness on the first day), and called out:

"Oi! If you don't speed up, you won't be able to get back in time for your next classes."

That thought was met with almost universal groans from his students. Edward shook his head. "If you can't even manage a light jog, what's going to happen when something scarier than _me_ is on your tail, eh? Bad guys don't stop to give you a break because you're _tired_! Pick up the pace!"

Again, he was met with groans, but most tried to shuffle into a slightly faster pace. It seemed as if they didn't quite want to disappoint their teacher on the first day. Edward approved. He didn't know that in all likelihood the reasoning for the females in the class to want to please him was more due to his looks than to his skills as a teacher.

Finally, with a mere five minutes to spare before the end of class, Heiderich's students were once more gathered at the front entrance of Hogwarts castle.

"All right!" Heiderich clapped his hands together, getting the attention of his (exhausted) students. "That was a good effort today! Tomorrow, we'll see how much further you can get." Once more this statement was met by muttered complaints. "Hey, hey!" They Professor barked. "You're not learning anything else until you can make it around the castle once without stopping! Come on, this is basic stuff!" The smile on his face was almost fanged, and definitely scary.

The fifth years did not look forward to tomorrow's class.

Rather more quickly than one would expect, considering their apparent exhaustion, the class filed inside the castle. Finally, all that were left were Heiderich, Alphonse and Draco Malfoy. It took the former a moment to notice that the latter was still there.

"Can I help you, Mr. Malfoy?" The professor asked, raising an eyebrow and the boy's dishevelled state – a far cry from the neat sleeked-back hair look that the boy had sported on the train and at the beginning of the class.

"I'd like my wand back." Malfoy ground out. He twitched in suppressed anger when Heiderich made a show of trying to remember where the wand had been left; patting down his robes ponderously, before finally withdrawing it from his right sleeve.

As soon as he did, Malfoy snatched it back, quietly examined it to see if it had been tampered with. After a moment, he waved it and produced a few angry looking green sparks. Apparently satisfied with this test, Malfoy shoved it up his own sleeve and left without another word.

Turning to his brother, Edward said with a smirk: "_I suppose it was too much to expect a __simple 'thank you', eh, Al?_"

Alphonse flashed a quick smile in return. "_I know it's a difficult concept to understand, but there __**are**__ some people__ in the world who are__ even ruder than you are, Nii-san."

* * *

_

Omake

"Oh, who's such a widdle cutie-pie?"

"Er—um – "

"Drawing itty-bitty pictures, are we?"

"Ah, well—"

"What did the ickle cutie-wutie draw?"

"Er – Nii-san! Help meeeee!"

"Leave him alone, you harpies! And fifteen points from Gryffindor!"

* * *

**Interlude – Mustang holds down the fort**

Today was the fourth anniversary of the death of the Fullmetal Alchemist. It was also the first annual "Alchemy for the People Day".

New holidays were deceptively easy for a ruler to declare, but it took a surprising amount of work to get a celebration organized. Furher Roy Mustang considered it definitely worth the effort (and even the paperwork).

He had been working for this day for nearly three years, almost immediately since he was sworn in as the first democratically elected Furher of Amestris. The people of the war-torn country needed something to celebrate and look forward to.

Although it was never stated outright, the populous of Amestris knew that this day would be better titled "The People's Alchemist Day", or, better yet, "Edward Elric Day". But Mustang had decided early on that creating an actual national holiday in his name would be demeaning to the memory of the boy – man, really – who was so much more than the legends (ha! They were already considered legends…) made him out to be.

For one, he had been much shorter.

But Mustang knew that an "Edward Elric Day" would twist Fullmetal into an icon – well, more than he already was, anyway. Back when the boy had been … alive… Roy had worked very hard to keep that ego down. He would never forgive himself if Fullmetal got a swelled head. "Edward Elric Day" indeed.

No, this was "Alchemy for the People Day". On this day, sate alchemists were required to do tasks – challenges, almost – for ordinary people, insofar as they could. Even civilian alchemists joined in: offering to build bridges, fix broken toasters, and make decorative fountains and so on, all for free. It was an exercise in constructive one-upmanship. It also had the dual use of acclimatizing civilians to State Alchemists. Ordinary citizens got to see the "dogs of the military" in a different light.

It was to be a celebration, a demonstration of a beautiful art and skill: not a memorial.

But somehow, after nearly a full day of merry-making, an element of sombreness worked its way in. There was the moment of contemplative silence right before the fireworks display. It hadn't been deliberate; it had just worked out that way. Roy himself, in ceremonial Furher garb, was the one to light the fireworks (natural, really, considering his alchemical aptitude for fiery atmospheric transmutations), but it had taken several minutes for the attendants to set them up. And there he was, solemnly waiting in his dark uniform and pristine white arrayed gloves resting casually on his decorative sword of state, staring at the ground, the eyes of what seemed like the entire population of Central City upon him…. And a spontaneous hush had overcome the crowd. There were no grand speeches made, but it seemed as if the People's Alchemist was on everyone's minds.

It was almost fitting, then, that the first firework to burst into the darkening sky was a bright shower of red and gold.

**Interlude: End**


End file.
